RECIPE: Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Brownies

Hello! Dropping in with a super quick recipe post cause Monday is over 😀 Lessons are over at least.

I made these brownies yesterday, because I haven’t baked in ages, and one of my goals after attending the Hygge the previous Sunday was to make more food from scratch. So what better way than to start with dessert?

These brownies were made using both chocolate chips and peanut butter chips (best invention ever). So no cocoa powder was needed!

And to make them slightly healthier, I used olive oil instead of butter. It’s really killing two birds with one stone cause it’s healthier, and the oil results in a moister brownie. Yummers.

These brownies were the moistest brownies I’ve made so far. Tastewise they were definitely good, but I think using dark chocolate chips would have been ever better to add a bittersweet dimension to them. I was really happy with the crackly top though!

I wanted to do one of those cool stacked brownie shots, but they were so moist that they refused to balance nicely. I managed to snap this in the few seconds they stayed together.

And then I gave up and just lay them down. Haha, I edited the photo below to make it look like one of those retro photos… You know to bring back memories of the brownies your grandma/momma used to make when you were young.

Okay, enough talking, here’s the recipe!

Recipe:
Adapted from here

Serves 16.

Ingredients

• ¾ cup self raising flour
• ½ tsp salt
• ¾ cup sugar
• ¾ cup (olive) oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons boiling water
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 1 cup chocolate chips, melted
• 1 cup peanut butter chips

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. (About 162 degrees celsius)
2. Melt chocolate chips in a water bath. (Put the chocolate chips in a metal bowl and set it in a larger bowl filled with boiling water. Stir until smooth. If the chocolate seizes after coming into contact with some water, add more hot water and keep stirring over the heat until it is smooth again.)
3. In a medium bowl, sift the flour and salt. Set aside.
4. In a separate bowl, add the eggs, sugar and oil and mix until combined for about 2 minutes. Add the water and the vanilla extract. Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture and melted chocolate chips and stir for about 3 minutes until combined.
5. Stir in 1 cup peanut butter chips.
6. Pour into a greased, parchment lined, or a greased foil-lined 8×8 square pan. Bake for 45 minutes.
7. When finished, remove from oven and allow to cool completely in pan on a wire rack.

   Switch things up!
   -Use chocolate chips instead of peanut butter chips
   -Add some mini marshmallows and maybe chopped walnuts and you’ve got some Rocky Road Brownies
   -Melt the peanut butter chips as well and swirl them in for a marbled effect

   Happy baking!

Healthy Peanut Butter Banana Bread Recipe

Is it a bread? Is it a cake? A healthy banana bread recipe? Is that even possible?

So many questions, so little time. Let’s skip the mundane questioning and jump straight in.

Brace yourselves for an amazing recipe that I’ve tweaked from Yammie’s brilliant recipe.

I wasn’t intending to make any changes apart from the type of flour used, but my brother ate one of the bananas I set aside for baking, so I ended up adding more applesauce to make up for it. Luckily, the end result was super moist and yummy. As I always do for baking, I omitted the salt.. you can’t even taste the difference honestly, so you might as well go without!

We were too eager to dig in that the bread was attacked from all directions, resulting in the oddly shaped leftover blocks.

But looks don’t matter of course, its what’s inside that counts.

And do you know what’s inside these not-so-aesthetically pleasing brown blocks?

PEANUT BUTTER CHIPS!!

See those light brown chunks that look like hunks of peanut? Those are the nomworthy peanut butter chips.

I was so pleased when I stumbled upon them in Walmart when I was in the United States. I used them once in Reeses’ Peanut Butter Chip Chocolate Cookies (sounds decadent eh?), but that’s another story.

This banana bread was so moist and flavorful, I couldn’t stop at a piece. (They are healthy, so I guess I can eat more right? :P) In fact, it tasted so good, you wouldn’t know that they were made without butter or oil! These taste best when they are fresh out of the oven, but they are still tasty when eaten at room temperature when you are on the go.

As everyone knows, peanut butter and banana were match made in heaven. So its actually no surprise that this pairing turned out so perfectly. Maybe someone should try a PBJ banana bread… now that would be an interesting threesome. (Keep those thoughts clean, there are children around)

I bet you aren’t even reading what I’m saying.. you’re probably just waiting for me to end this long story and share the recipe with you. Well, the time has come… *drumroll*

PB CUBE RECIPE (Peanut Butter Banana Bread)

 {See what I did there? B cube cause there are three Bs and I spelled cube out cause I cut them into cubes!  *Crickets chirping*  You better get that funny bone checked, my friend… You seem to be suffering from a severe lack of humor.}

Jokes aside, here’s the recipe, for real this time.

Made in a 9×9 baking tin. (Should fill a 10 inch loaf pan)

You’ll need:

2 large eggs
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cup wholewheat flour
1 cup peanut butter chips
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon (tweaked to your liking)
1 cup mashed ripe bananas

Switch things up with: chocolate chips, dried fruits, chopped nuts etc.

Steps:

1) Grease your loaf pan or baking tin. (I suggest you lay a baking sheet for easy removal)

2) Preheat the oven to 350º F.

3) Mix together the eggs, honey, applesauce, and vanilla.

4) Mix together the flour, salt, soda, powder, and cinnamon and add to the wet ingredients. Stir in the mashed bananas and mix well.

5) Add in any mix-ins. (I added PB chips!)

6) Pour into the loaf pan/baking tin and bake for 45 minutes.

Now enjoy the delicious smells that will come wafting from your oven in a couple of minutes. Ahh, the sweet smell of success.

Hope you like the recipe!